As Xander, Gabrelle, Freyja, and Xander’s two golems made their way towards the gate that would lead them to the road once more, there were many handshakes, claps on the back, and heartfelt thanks. The men and women that Gabrelle had healed of their injuries, both from the caravan and the town itself with everyday injuries, clasped her hands and thanks her, or waved to her and called out goodbyes. Xander was met with many respectful nods by the guards of the town, who stood to gain the most from the improved defenses and weapons he had provided. These things could be the difference between life and death for them some day. Freyja had managed to gather a cult following of children, unbeknownst to Xander, as she had wandered the town during his days of working. There were many of them gathered around her, stroking her fur in the places her armor did not cover her, and she carefully rubbed her cheeks against many of the children as she moved past. Some of them were crying, sad to see the cat go. Xander smiled inside. It warmed his heart to see the cat doted upon so by the children.
The well wishes ended abruptly as the gate closed, cutting off the sounds of the townsfolk. A final cry of “Safe travels!” from one of the guards atop the tower situated next to the gate as they began their journey again echoed towards them. Xander turned and waved to the guard and the town before continuing on with Gabrelle.
Xander felt mentally restored, the weight of protecting the survivors finally off of his shoulders. They would be safe in the town until they decided to move on with another caravan. Perhaps some would simply decide to integrate into the town and stay, even. His perceived failure during the battle that had resulted in the destruction of the caravan still weighed on him, though. He hadn’t spoken to Gabrelle about it, yet. Perhaps he would discuss it with her, see what insight she had for him.
As they walked, they also talked. “Past Rantol, the issues with banditry should begin to lessen,” Gabrelle explained to him. “The closer to the border of Sempta we get, the better patrolled the land will be. Thrask might not be doing much to halt the issues within the country, but they do maintain a garrison near the border. And Sempta itself has their land more under control, considering they weren’t involved in the war between Thrask and Dardin.”
They didn’t encounter anyone on the road that day. Looking at the map that Gabrelle kept in a leather tube in her bag – he realized it was the same one he’d gifted her after the mishap with heaven’s bounty – he saw that the next city they’d pass through would be just before the border of Sempta. It was marked on the map as Hardan. Gabrelle told him that Hardan was a trade and mining town. Much of the traffic coming to and from Sempta on the main road came through the town, and there were several iron mines nearby. From Hardan, large amounts of iron and steel were processed and flowed out to fuel the work of the [Blacksmith]s, [Tinker]s, and other artisans of Sempta and the former kingdom of Dardin, now just another territory of Thrask.
Xander’s two golems stood sentry on either end of the camp, ordered to alert him should anyone come near. He’d continued applying [Golemancer] to the two constructs, though he still had a ways to go before they would reach the level of stacks that he had managed to apply to June, though. Still, he felt confident that they would be able to detect any intruders, and it’s not like he would actually be asleep anyway. Sitting in the tent with Gabrelle, he finally spoke up.
“Gabrelle? About the… the attack on the caravan. I can’t help thinking that I could have done more. Could have planned or thought about it better… and if I had, all those people might not have died.”
Gabrelle looked at Xander sadly. “Oh Xander,” she sighed. “There’s always something we could have done better when we look into the past.”
“I know…” he said dejectedly, “but… I just wish I’d done more. Thought harder about things, instead of just rushing into the fight. I could have used by abilities better. I didn’t use my mask at all for the [Aura of Fear]. If I’d trusted you and Freyja to hold one side, I could have gone straight to the other flank, and maybe it wouldn’t have collapsed… there’s just so much that might have gone differently.”
Gabrell laid a hand on his armored shoulder. “There’s nothing you can do about it, now Xander. The only thing you can do, the only thing that can make all that carnage, all that death, mean anything is to learn from it. It sounds like you already are, in your own way. We all have failures. I… watched so many die, unable to heal them quickly enough to keep them from fading away, during the war. I still see them, sometimes, when I close my eyes. But I’ve started to forgive myself for it. I did what I could and what I thought was best at the time. Looking back, not all of my decisions were the best, though. But all I can do now is try not to repeat those mistakes.”
“You’re right… I know you’re right. I just, I can still remember it all happening so vividly. Seeing those fuckers pulling people out of carts, dragging them off by their hair, or just putting them to the sword right then and there. And… I hate myself for not being able to stop it. It feels like it was all my fault.”
Gabrelle nodded. “It’s hard, when you’re one of the ones with power. People like us, people who have classes that can let them change the world around them, be it through violence or other means, we do bear a special kind of burden. And a certain kind of hubris. I’ve met so many mercs who’ve said the same thing, and I’ve felt it myself, in the time when we were without you, that things were my fault. That if only I’d done something different, or tried harder somehow, things would have gone better. And maybe they would have. Maybe, Xander, the burden of fault does fall on people like us, because who else could do anything?” Gabrelle took a deep breath. “But I don’t believe so. I think that it’s prideful to think that we can always succeed, that there’s always something more we can do, or that we have minds that are so much better that we should have thought of something that no one else should have. Despite the gifts that the gods, or the status sheet, or whatever you believe in, have given us with our classes and skills, we’re still just human.”
Xander nodded slowly, silent. He was still mulling over her words. It would take time for him to come to terms with such a large failure, but perhaps, if he could view through such a lens as Gabrelle did… he might one day be able to.
Gabrelle interrupted his thoughts, with a good-natured slap on the back. “Well, I’m only human, anyways. Who knows what in the hells you are at this point.”
Xander chuckled slightly at her comment. “Fuck, I sure don’t… but my mind is still human. I don’t feel like I think any differently. I still feel the same things. Some things are… muted, a little, though. This body doesn’t have the same, ah… feedbacks? I guess that works. It doesn’t have the same feedback as my human body did.”
Gabrelle cocked an eyebrow at his statement. “What do you mean?”
“Uh… well, I guess an easy one to explain is lust, or arousal, whatever you want to call it. I’m pretty sure I can still feel turned on. But at the same time, even though I can feel things, it’s just not quite the same. It’s all uniform, versus how like, if you are touched by something on the back of your hand and then on your palm, it feels different. So there’s no… erogenous zones. A hand on, say, the inside of my thigh would feel the same as a hand on my shoulder. So there’s not the same physical feedback. The whole process feels… duller. The upside is, I don’t have to deal with any awkwardness that the average man might when it comes to platonically cuddling, I suppose.” Xander paused, thinking, as another example came to him. “It’s similar when I find something funny. I can still find things funny, but, without the ability to actually smile, or open my mouth and truly laugh… it takes some of the effect away. Sure, I can make the sound of laughing, but it’s just me operating my runes, there’s no physical shaking of my body as I laugh, and I’ll never start to feel my stomach start to cramp from laughing so much.” He released a sigh, the noise issuing from the runes on his facial area. It, too, was less satisfying than a real sigh. “Fuck, even sighing isn’t the same. I hope I start to adjust. It’s not… major for me. It kind of reminds me of when I was struggling with depression, years ago, to be honest. The muted feelings. But still, it irks me.”
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Gabrelle nodded slowly, taking in the information that Xander was giving her. “I… I’m not sure exactly what to say. I think I understand your analogy about depression. After the war, when it really start to hit me just what we’d all gone through… things felt so… far away. Like my emotions were all an arm’s length away instead of inside me like they should have been. I hope you do adjust, Xander. I’d hate for you to have to live with a frustration like that forever… something like that might seem small now, but what about five years from now? Maybe… maybe you can modify your body in some way? I don’t know. But I do know that I have confidence in you.”
If Xander had lips, and wasn’t still wearing his helmet, he would have smiled. “Thanks, Gabrelle. I’m sorry for bringing up such heavy topics right before bed… but I just needed to get those thought out of my head. Talking with you about things like this, well, it makes them easier, in a way, for me to process.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and gave her a short, sideways hug. “You know, if you ever need to talk about things yourself, I’ll listen. I know you’ve mentioned… things that happened while I was gone, but you’ve never gone into specifics. If you ever feel the need to talk about them, or anything else for that matter, I’m here.”
“Thanks, Xander,” she said. “Maybe one day. I’ve… mostly made my peace with things. Mostly. I made it out of things in far better shape than many can say they did. It’s good to know I have an open ear in you, though. Speaking of listening to my needs… do you think I could rest my head on your chest? It’s starting to get colder, now, and those heating runes are really nice. I’ll need a pillow of course, with that hard armor of yours, but mmm, there’s nothing like a warm pillow on a chilly night.”
“Weirdo,” Xander retorted. “Pillows should be cold! A cold pillow with a warm blanket is the perfect, soothing counterbalance. But whatever floats your boat, I guess.”
Gabrelle laughed in response, and tossed the small pillow that went with her bedroll onto his chest. Soon, he was being used like the world’s deadliest body pillow as the slim, blonde-haired woman curled up to him, threw one leg over his waist as he lay on his back, and laid her head on the pillow that his chest was beginning to warm up. He pumped a little extra mana into the runes that kept his steel body mimicking the warmth of a human body as Gabrelle slowly fell asleep.
There were still two months’ worth of travel for Xander and Gabrelle to reach their location within Sempta. Xander realized that besides the name of the country, he knew little about where they were going.
“Hey Gabrelle, what’s the name of the city in Sempta that we’re going to?”
“Oh, I guess I never mentioned it. It’s a port town called Rock’s Bay. It’s named after the big piece of stone that rises up out of the center of the bay. It’s a busy town. Reminds me of Anlet, actually, though the ships are larger.”
“Huh. Alright. Thanks. Should I expect things to be different than they are in Dardin?”
“Mmm… Not really. It’s warmer, since it’s further South, but other than that, it’s not too different. From Thrask down the Krepash, the cultures are generally pretty similar. North past Thrask there are some dwarven kingdoms, though of course there are still other races that live in the kingdoms. Graffus is probably the best one to tell you about them. South of Krepash, you have the Elven fiefdoms. I don’t know why they’re called fiefdoms and not kingdoms, though. Just are. I don’t know much about them. I know you’ve seen elves before in Anlet, and you’ll see them in Rock’s Bay, too, but they tend to keep to themselves. Can’t say I’ve ever had the opportunity to speak to one.”
“Wonder why they’re like that,” Xander said.
“Beats me,” Gabrelle replied. “Theories abound, though.”
“Oh yeah, like what?” Xander was interested now.
“Well, the two I hear most are that they’re either so snobby and stuck up their own ass they don’t deem the average person ‘worthy’ to speak to in the first place, which I don’t believe, or that, because they’re so long lived, even more than dwarves, they just struggle to relate to people who are born, live, and die in what must be to them, a short period of time. Like, imagine someone talking about their whole life to you, but from your perspective, it’s just been a week. I don’t know if that one’s true either, but it rings a little truer than them just being asses.
Xander nodded, but stayed silent. The concept of anyone living that long was hard to wrap his head around. Would he end up like that? It’s not like he was aging anymore, after all. Maybe he could make friends with some elves if that turned out to be the case, he thought to himself with a mental laugh. He tried not to think about the fact that if it were true, he’d end up watching everyone he knew in this world grow old and die before him.
“Something on your mind?” Gabrelle probed him, not having received a response.
“Mmm, just thinking about what living that long must be like. I wonder if it’s lonely for them if there aren’t many other elves around.”
“Might be,” Gabrelle posited. “’Course, you live as long as an elf, and spending a century in a city doing trading might be like taking a few months for a business trip before returning home. Hard to tell.”
“Hmm. Maybe. So weird…” He trailed off, unsure what else to say about the topic.
“Do the dwarven or elven kingdoms war with each other like happens here?” He asked, finally.
“Uhmm… I assume so? Well, I know the dwarves have. They had a big civil war once, and I’ve heard of other wars, too. The elves? Not much news comes from there, but I’ve heard of the occasional myth involving some relic or other lost during an elven war. Atrax might know. I do know that a few generations back, the king of Krepash tried to take a portion of an elven fiefdom’s land and was soundly rebuffed. They had far fewer soldiers, but considering how long they lived for, they were also much higher leveled.”
“Huh. So not only are they immortal or nearly immortal, the fact that they exist so long basically guarantees them superpowers?”
“Well, I guess you could look at it that way. But how many people do you think can tell the difference between, say, a level seventy-five woodcarver’s work and a similar piece by an elven woodcarver who’s level two hundred or whatever? Not many. Mostly elves, which is why they tend to do more exporting than importing, and even then it’s mostly goods for people who are vain enough to care about that level of difference. I suppose it’s more valuable in a combat situation, where things like passive skills are just taken up to incredible levels. But still, no matter how highly leveled someone is, if you put enough holes in them, or hit them hard enough, they’ll go down. Merc teams have taken out elves before, from what I hear. They aren’t immune to having their own criminal element.”
“You know, that’s something that the first person I ever met in this world told me. That with enough preparation, you can defeat anything that’s a higher level than you. Guess he was right.”
“That’s good advice. Although, even better advice is to avoid having to defeat things that are higher level than you in the first place,” Gabrell countered.
“Oh yeah, because I totally get to choose what level the random things I face in life are.”
“Wait, you don’t?” Gabrelle asked, sarcastically. “Sucks for you, I do.”